THE HELLENICA OXYRHYNCHIA ITS AUTHORSHIP AND AUTHORITY BY E. M. WALKER FELLOW AND TUTOR OF QUEEN's COLLEGE, OXFORD OXFORD AT THE CLARENDON PRESS 1913 OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS LONDON EDINBURGH GLASGOW NEW YORK TORONTO MELBOURNE BOMBAY HUMPHREY MILFORD M.A. PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY A 33/5" BERNARDO P. GRENFELL ARTVRO S. HUNT OLIM DISCIPVLIS lAM PEIDEM COLLEGIS REGINENSIS EEGINENSIBVS D. D. HVNC LIBELLVM SCRIPTOR Qfii (\OA CONTENTS PAGE INTRODUCTION 7 LECTURE I The literature of the controversy . . .15 LECTURE II The current assumptions 27 LECTURE m The case for Ephorus . . . . .49 LECTURE IV The case against Ephorus examined. . . 79 LECTURE V The credibility of the narrative . . .111 LECTURE VI The Boeotian League 134 INTRODUCTION The lectures which are co'ntained in this volume were delivered in Michaelmas Term, 1912, at the invitation of the Delegates of the Common University Fund, to whom I am indebted for an opportunity of giving expression to my views regarding the authorship and historical value of the famous fragment, which has come to be known (most unfortunately, in my judge- ment) as the Hellenica Oxyrhynchia. But for the invitation which they extended to me the lectures would not have been given, nor the book written. I wish to make it plain, in the first place, that the lectures are what they profess to be — lectures. They were delivered before they were written, and they were delivered ex tempore, in the sense in which sermons are said to be preached ex tempore ; that is, they were delivered without the aid of manuscript .or notes. Four out of the six were taken down by reporters, and they are printed from the shorthand writers* notes. A few changes have been made: occasional repetitions have been struck out, clauses have been sometimes transposed, a sentence here and there has been touched up, once or twice an argument which upon reflection ceased to satisfy me has been omitted, and some additional references have been inserted ; but if any of those who attended the course should do me the honour to read the lectures in print, they are ,8 INTRODUCTION not likely to detect the alterations. The fifth lecture was written out from memory. The last lecture did not form part of the course. It was prepared, but the time at my disposal did not allow of its delivery. It has been delivered often enough, I fear, to my college pupils across my table. It is as lectures that I ask that they should be judged. There is a substantial difference between a lecture in the proper sense and a lecture in the con- ventional sense ; by which I mean a chapter of a book which is read aloud to a class. In the one case, the lecture exists before the book ; in the other, the book exists before the lecture. This is not the occasion on which to argue which is the better as a lecture; all that I am concerned to point out is that they are different. The lecture proper owes its form to the class, just as the lecture by convention owes its form to the study and the desk. The class reacts upon the lecturer : he is conscious of the presence of his audience, and quick to mark the argument that misses fire ; the * we ' and the ' you ' have a better right for their appearance than that of a mere literary tradition ; even the 'I* will be unduly prominent. If in the present lectures the first person obtrudes itself more often than I could wish, I trust that it may be read as a note of intimacy, rather than of dogmatism. They are intended, too, as lectures upon certain clearly defined problems, not as a commentary upon the whole contents of the fragment. A good deal might be said on many subjects which I have left untouched ; on Demaenetus, or Theban politics, or the naval operations, or the eroy 6y8oov, The omissions INTRODUCTION 9 are designed : I have said nothing, either because a discussion of these questions seem to me irrelevant to the main issues, or else because I had nothing of my own to say. Where I had nothing new to con- tribute in the way of suggestion, argument, or criticism, I preferred to say nothing. It is for the same reason that I have contented myself with the briefest summary of the arguments which were advanced in my article in Klio. One of the strongest arguments for Ephorus is to be found in the disproof of the case for Theopompus ; this is a task which has been attempted in Klio, to which I must refer my readers. Nor have I discussed, explicitly at least, the claims of Cratippus. It is not because I have been convinced either that he is a phantom or a writer of the Alexan- drine epoch that I have deserted his cause. I am still prepared to assert for Cratippus all that I asserted five years ago : a flesh-and-blood existence, a floruit midway between Thucydides and Xenophon, Athenian citizenship, and a range of subject from Cyzicus to Cnidus ; eyo) fikv ovv 6 avrS^ €i/jll tjJ yvcofirj. And I still infer from the fragment all, or almost all, the character- istics which I claimed for P. If I no longer claim that he is an Athenian (and I claimed it very doubtfully), I claim that he is next door to an Athenian ; that he was in closest touch with Athens. But on such funda- mental questions as those of style, of date of composition, and of political sympathies, I have nothing to retract. I have thrown up my brief for Cratippus, not because I can no longer contend against the weight of hostile evidence, but, simply and solely, because I have ventured to examine the current assumptions which were held 10 INTRODUCTION to bar the claim of Ephorus. The case for Cratippus did not rest upon the positive evidence in his favour. The positive evidence for an author who is referred to less than half a dozen times in all, and whose fragments sum up to less than a dozen lines, must necessarily be slight. The argument by which I sought to establish his identity with P. was deductive, rather than induc- tive, and the case was, admittedly, strongest on its negative side. If P. could not be Theopompus, he must be Cratippus ; he must be, for there is no third possibility. If once this premiss is denied ; if once it can be established that neither the scale of P. nor his oiKovofiia constitutes an insuperable objection to his identification with Ephorus, the one strong argument for Cratippus — the disjunctive one — disappears. P. cannot be Theopompus, but he may be Ephorus or Cratippus. And for Ephorus the positive evidence is not slight, but ample. We know nothing about the style of Cratippus, or his political standpoint, or his sympathies and antipathies, or his intellectual level ; though we know something of the scope of his work, we know almost nothing of its contents. We cannot, at any rate, test its coincidences with P. The opposite of all this holds good of Ephorus. His literary style and the temper of his mind, his political standpoint, his choice of subjects and the order of his narrative, even his actual phraseology, can all be verified. If any of my readers find that the arguments which I have adduced on all these various points are convincing, I am fairly certain that they will not turn back to reconsider the case for Cratippus. In discussing the probable length of a book of INTRODUCTION 11 Ephorus, and of a line of Theopompus, I have not thought it necessary to refer to the results arrived at by Graux, in his paper on Stichometrie in the volume of the Revue de Philologie for 1878, because it appeared to me that his conclusions throw little light upon the problems with which I was concerned. The hypothesis of a standard arixo? of thirty-four to thirty-eight letters, or fifteen to sixteen syllables (the mean length of the hexameter line), has received no little confirmation since Stichometrie first appeared ; but this confirmation has not come from the science of Papyrology, which was as yet unborn when the article was written. A. a-TLxos of thirty-four to thirty-eight letters may have been something more than an ideal standard by which to compute the relative length of literary works, or the due remuneration of the scribe ; the evidence suggests that it must sometimes have been an actual standard to which the copyist conformed. In our extant papyri, however, so far from being a normal length, it is an unusual one. This renders it certain that it was not a Kavcou to , which the copyist was bound to conform, or which invariably regulated the length of his line. Hence, Graux's investigations do not serve to fix tlie mean length of the eirrj of Theopompus ; we are not compelled to assume for his Hellenica 150,000 lines of thirty-four or thirty-eight letters apiece. In the same way it is clear that Graux s average for the length of a roll, 2,000 v 8ia to ^dpos rfj^ kTridTaata^ j ^ovto paStoas KaTaXv(T€iv avTcou Trjv r/ycfioviay . . . Kal irpcoTOv pkv avpeSpLOu KOLVov kv ttJ Kopipdco ovaT-qadpevoL tov^ fiovXeva-opi- vovs enepTTOv . . . perd 8k ravTa . . . ttoXXovs avppd)^ovs dno AaKeSaipovicov aTrea-Trjaav. This passage renders it clear that Diodorus intended by the phrase t6t€ ravrris ia-TeprjOrja-ay^ not the battle of Cnidus, but the first congress of the anti-Laconian league at Corinth, and ' XIV. 2. 1. c2 36 THE CURRENT ASSUMPTIONS n the consequent resolution of the Spartan government to recall Agesilaus. If you look at these two passages in Diodorus, I think you will be quite convinced that that is what Diodorus meant. Nor is there in Diodorus* narrative any trace whatever that the battle of Cnidus formed a break in the story. My own view, therefore^ is that the terminus a quo is the dispatch of Thibron, and the terminus ad quern the decision on the part of the Spartan government to recall Agesilaus. This gives us, then, the answer to our first question, that of the scope of Book XVIII of Ephorus. The next question to be answered is this : Can we determine the probable length of a book of Ephorus ? It is natural to turn to Xenophon in the first instance, because he includes the period covered by P., and by Book XVIII of Ephorus. Book III of Xenophon s Hellenics is 1,000 lines long, and the longest book in the Hellenics is only 1,300 lines in length. If these figures afforded us any probable indication of the length of a book of Ephorus, it is clear that the claims of Ephorus need not further detain us. What, however, are the figures for the other two classical historians ? When we turn to Thucydides we find that the average is 2,300 lines, and that one book runs to 2,800 lines. In Herodotus, one book, Book VII, runs to 3,500 lines, and another. Book I, to 3,700 lines. Here, no doubt, we are deaUng with authors who did not themselves divide their works into books. The division was made in the Alexandrine period, it is true ; but none the less it is evidence, because it shows what people in the Alexandrine period thought a reasonable length for a book. But, clearly, the evidence is much better when it is derived from works in which the division into books proceeded from the author's own hand. I propose to II THE CURRENT ASSUMPTIONS 87 turn, first of all, to Diodorus ; and to Diodorus for two reasons. Firstly, he, like Ephorus, wrote a universal history ; secondly, as he had Ephorus before him, nothing is more natural than that he should have been guided by the length of a book of Ephorus in determining the length of one of his own books. So entirely imitative is Diodorus. Now, what are the facts ? If we take the third pentad of Diodorus from Book XI to Book XV (that is, the books which include this period), we find that the average length of a book is 3,500 lines, while two books run to 4,300 lines. We may turn next to still better evidence, the evidence of Polybius. If Ephorus was the first historian of whom it can be said with certainty that the division into books was due to the author himself, Polybius is the first extant author of whom the same can be said. There are five books of Polybius which are complete. The average length of those five is 3,700 lines ; the last book. Book V, runs to 4,100, and Book III runs to 4,600 lines. If a book of Polybius runs to 4,500 lines and more, I can see no reason why a book of Ephorus may not have run to 4,500 lines also. And now let us attempt to get back to the age of Ephorus himself. Let us take his great contemporary, Theopompus. If you turn to frag- ment 25 (h) ^ you will find a passage from Photius' Bihliotheca,^ which contains a long excerpt from the first book of Theopompus' Phili;ppica. Theopompus is, among other things, boasting of his literary output before he had set hand to the Philippica. He tells us that his kmSeiKTLKol \6yoi, his oratorical works, ran to more than 20,000 lines, and his Hellenica to 150,000 lines. These are his words : ovk k\aTTovv ''KWrjvccv kol pappdpcov 7rpd^€LS /J'^XP'' ^^^ aTrayycXXofiivas '4(ttl Xafielv, That i& clearly a reference to the Hellenica. Thus the twelve books of the Hellenica ran to 150,000 lines. But what was the length of a line in a manuscript of the age of Theopompus ? That is not easy to determine. In verse, the extreme limit was given by the hexa- meter line, but for prose there is no such standard available. If we take the extant papyri of every age, we find that the number of letters in a line varies from upwards of forty (this is the case with the Hellenica Oxyrhynchia) to an average as low as fifteen, which is found in a papyrus fragment of the Panegyricus of Isocrates.^ As the lines in the printed text of the Oxford edition of the Hellenica Oxyrhynchia contain, on the average, forty-five letters, the highest average gives us a line approximately equal to a line of the printed text, while the lowest average gives us a line which is one-third the length of the printed line. Even if we assume that the lines of which Theopompus spoke (he was boasting, and therefore he might have selected the shortest he could find) were lines of fifteen letters only, that is, that they were a third the length of our printed lines, we shall get a minimum of 50,000 lines for the twelve books, or more than 4,000 lines to a book — a striking confirmation of my own calculation for Ephorus. If it is argued that a work on such a scale as is implied in twenty-nine books, with an average of something like 4,000 lines apiece (i.e. 116,000 lines in all), is inconceivable for Ephorus, it may fairly be replied that this total, formidable as it may appear, must have * Oxyrhynchus Papyrij vol. v, pp. 292 ff. II THE CURRENT ASSUMPTIONS 39 l)een exceeded by the Philippica of Theopompus. If 4,000 lines are allowed for each of the fifty-seven books, the total will be as high as 230,000 lines ; if the average of a book is put as low as 2,000 lines, the total will still approximate to that which we have argued for Ephorus. I think, therefore, that I am justified in assuming that a length of 4,500 lines for a particular book is entirely consistent with the scale of a universal history extending to twenty-nine books. To come now to the third question, Can we determine the probable length of P. for the period covered by Book XVIII of Ephorus; i.e. from the beginning of 399 to the beginning of 394, a period of five years ? What is the length of the extant portion of P. ? I propose to limit my calculation to the three last sections — B, C, and D. I omit A altogether from the calculation, for the very simple reason that the correct position of A is a matter of dispute. Let us take the three last sections, from chapter vi to the end, which cover the period from the spring of 395 to the moment when Agesilaus went into winter quarters at the end of the year. The number of extant lines, whether perfect or incomplete, in these sections is a little over 600. There is evidence for another 50. That makes 650 in all. One or two columns are probably lost, but, in Dr. Hunt's opinion, not more than one or two. For these we may allow another 100 lines ; and that will give us a total of 750 lines. From the second campaign of Agesilaus to his recall (the terminus ad quern which I have assumed for Ephorus) we have to allow for the following events : ^ the battle of Haliartus, Conon's * A certain inference from Diod. XIV. 81-83. 1. 40 THE CURRENT ASSUMPTIONS ii mission to the Persian court, the formation of the anti- Laconian league in Greece, the operations in northern Greece (Thessaly, Heraclea, Phocis), and, lastly, the recall of Agesilaus. If we allow for these incidents two-thirds as much, say, 500 lines, the allowance will be a liberal one, I think. That will give us, for the period from the beginning of 395 to the spring of 394, a total of some 1,250 lines. Now let us work backward. The year 395 was an exceptionally heavy year, because it included, not only operations of an important character both on land and sea, but also two campaigns of Agesilaus, as well as exceedingly important events in Greece. In the year 396 there was only one brief campaign of Agesilaus. The naval operations, it is true, were important — perhaps more important than in the succeeding year ; but there appear to have been no incidents of importance in Greece itself, if we may draw any inference from the silence of Diodorus. In other words, it was comparatively a light year. Let us allow for it 800 lines. For the two preceding years, 397 and 398 — the years of Dercylidas' command — 1,000 lines would be a generous allowance, seeing that Dercy- lidas was mainly occupied in making truces. Finally, if we allow 500 or 600 lines for Thibron, we shall get for the period covered by Book XVIII of Ephorus a total of something like 3,500 lines. Such a calculation, of course, advances no claim to accuracy. It is more than probable that there were events recorded by Ephorus which have left no trace in the narrative of Diodorus ; but there is a surplus of 1,000 lines to play with, and that is more than sufficient to meet any reasonable demand. Before I can proceed to attempt an answer to the next question, I must deal with an objection that is II THE CURRENT ASSUMPTIONS 41 likely to be advanced against the value of these calcula- tions. My assumption has been that Book XVIII of Ephorus started with the dispatch of Thibron to the coast of Asia Minor, at the beginning of the winter of 400/399. In the third book, however, of Xenophon's Hellenics there are two events that are narrated at con- siderable length, which are placed by Xenophon after the dispatch of Thibron ; namely, the Spartan invasion of Elis, and the conspiracy of Cinadon. I anticipate that it may be urged that in my calculation I ought to have allowed a considerable number of lines for both of these incidents. As to the former of these, the Spartan invasion of Elis, it is certain that it was narrated by Ephorus, and I think it may be inferred from the account in Diodorus that it was narrated in considerable detail ; but it is also certain from Diodorus that it was narrated, not in Book XVIII of Ephorus, if that book began with Thibron's expedition, but in Book XVII. This is apparent, both from the chrono- logy of Diodorus, and from the order in which he narrates the events of that period. So far as the chronology goes, he puts the invasion of Elis in the year 402/1, the conclusion of peace between Sparta and Elis in the year 401/400, and the expedition of Thibron in the year 400/399. The first and the last of these dates are indisputably correct : the war with Elis began in the year 402/1, and the expedition of Thibron was in the year 400/399. If there is any error in Diodorus' chronology, it is that the conclusion of peace was probably in the year 399, and not in the year 400. Therefore, quite clearly on that showing, the Spartan invasion of Elis would have been narrated in Book XVII, and not in Book XVIII, of Ephorus. That inference is confirmed by the order in which the events 42 THE CURRENT ASSUMPTIONS ii are placed by Diodorus. Between the outbreak of the war and the invasion of Elis,on the one hand, and the con- clusion of peace, on the other, Diodorus narrates the expedition of the Ten Thousand and, oddly enough, the overthrow of the Thirty at Athens; and between the conclusion of peace and the dispatch of Thibron to Asia Minor he narrates the expulsion of the Messenians from Cephallenia.^ Clearly then, the Spartan invasion of Elis formed no part of the eighteenth book of Ephorus. Next, as to the conspiracy of Cinadon. It is narrated at length in Xenophon, but there is no evidence that it was narrated at all by Ephorus. There is, at any rate, no mention of it in Diodorus ; though, of course, that is not conclusive. But it is quite likely that Ephorus may have entirely omitted it, or may have narrated it very briefly. As will be seen presently, Meyer admits that, while P. had very full sources of informa- tion for Boeotia and for Athens, he does not betray any trace of information derived from purely Spartan sources. Finally, can we determine the scale of Ephorus relatively to the scale of Xenophon ? There is, unfortunately, only one passage which permits of a direct comparison between the two authors. This is a fragment (130) of Ephorus, relating to Dercy- lidas, which can be compared with the corresponding sentence in the Hellenics J^ Ephorus and Xenophon are both concerned with the explanation of the nickname Sisyphus, which was given to Dercylidas, and this is how they respectively explain it. ' Diod. XIV. 17. 2-12 ; 19-31 ; 32, 33 ; 34 •, 36. 2 Xen. Hell III. 1. 8. I I II THE CURRENT ASSUMPTIONS 48 Xenophon. Ephorus. 'Av^p 8okS>v €hai fxdXa (^AaKeSai/xSvioi . . . Afpicv- fjLr])(avT]TiK6s' Kal in^KaXeiTO XiSau i^ne^y^av) olkovovt^^ on 8k Xi(TV(l>09. irdvTa npaTTHu iicoOaa-iv ol 7T€pl T^u 'Acrmi/ fidpfiapoi fiera aTrarTy? Kal S6Xov. AiSirep AcpKvXiSav €7r€ /jiyffau rjKLora i^op,i(ouT€9 f^aTraT-qOrjaea-dai' Tju yap ovSeu ep T(p rpoirco AaKcoviKov ovSk dnXovu ex^cov, dXXa TToXif to rravovpyov Kal TO drjpmSes. Aib Kal Xl- avoi/^ avTou ol AaKeSaLp-ouLOi TTpoarjyopevop. Xenophon does it in 9 words, and Ephorus in 44 ; a slight but significant piece of evidence. But we can arrive at a comparison of the scale of Ephorus and Xenophon indirectly, on other evidence ; namely, from a comparison of the descriptions given by Diodorus and Xenophon respectively of three of the battles in the last period of the Peloponnesian War — Abydos, Cyzicus, and Arginusae. In Diodorus the battle of Abydos occupies 90 lines, in Xenophon 25 ; the battle of Cyzicus, 125 lines in Diodorus and 45 in Xenophon ; the battle of Arginusae, down to the defeat of the Spartans (i.e. not including the failure to rescue the survivors and to recover the dead), in Diodorus takes 110 lines and in Xenophon 45 lines. Now, no doubt some features in the descriptions of these battles may have been added Ijy Diodorus ; on the other hand, it must be remembered that Diodorus is epitomizing Ephorus. A description which ran to 110 lines in Diodorus must certainly have run to not less than 110, probably to a great deal more than 110, in Ephorus. If, * A certain correction for Skv^ov, the reading of the MSS. 44 THE CURRENT ASSUMPTIONS ii therefore, we can draw any inference from these com- parisons, we find that Ephorus was something like three times, or from two to three times, as diffuse as Xenophon in his descriptions. But the comparison does not end here. A glance at Diodorus shows us that, while Xenophon is silent as to the naval operations down to the beginning of the year 394, they bulk very large in Ephorus. Further also, we see from Diodorus that Ephorus narrated many incidents in the history of Greece proper, of which not one word is to be found in Xenophon ; that is to say, he dealt with a far wider range of subject. If, therefore, Xenophon covered four years in 1,000 lines, it is not an extravagant assump- tion — -it is a fairly certain inference — that Ephorus must have devoted something like 3,000 lines, at least, to these four years, and, consequently, something approaching 4,000 lines to the five years covered in Book XVIII. Any argument, therefore, against the claims of Ephorus, which is based upon the supposed scale of his work, breaks down completely. So far from the argument from the scale being an argument against his claims, it is an argument, and a very strong argument, in favour of them. We have disposed of the question of scale. We must now turn to the question of method. Our starting-point must be the well-known passage in the preface to Book V of Diodorus,^ to which I have already referred. Diodorus there says that Ephorus was successful, not only in his literary treatment of the subject, but also in the arrangement of his matter : "E^opoy ^e ray Koivas irpd^eLS dvaypdv Papfidpoiv. KaToXafiovTes Sk ^vXaKrju ov (r7Tov8aL[(09 K]a6€[crTa)]- aav Ta)(€(09 alpovaiv, koI XafiPdvovaLv avTCdv [ttoXJA^j^ fikv dyopav av^vovs Se dvOpd>7rov9, iroXXa Se aKevrj Kal XprjfjLaTa. It becomes in Diodorus, XIV. 80. 4 : O/ 8k TTCpl Toi^ ' Ayrja-iXaov p-^Xpi- p-^v tlpo9 €7rL8id>^aPT€9, dpeiXov p\v vnep tov9 i^aKiTooi^ 81 woXv nXijOos rjOpOLcrav ttjv 5e TrapepfioXriv BLrjpTracTav, yepLOvaav^ TToAXooi/ dyaBS>v. Yet it is here, in the narrative of Agesilaus' first campaign, that Meyer claims to have discovered dis- crepancies which disprove for ever the hypothesis that Ephorus is P. Between the narrative in Diodorus and the narrative in P. he finds discrepancies, which, he asserts, are only to be explained by the hypothesis that Ephorus, the intermediary, while closely following the narrative of P., varied it in detail. The first of these discrepancies relates to the number of the slain. It is given in P. as 600, in Diodorus as 6,000. This is, according to Meyer, a characteristic example of the Ephorean method. It is, I think, a simpler hypothesis to assume a slip on the part of Diodorus, or, more likely, of a copyist. Ancient literature teems with parallel examples. The second discrepancy is, perhaps, rather more serious ; only, unfortunately, P. is so fragmentary at this point, that it is difficult to deter- mine what stood there. It relates to the number of troops under Tissaphernes. In Diodorus the numbers are given as 10,000 foot and 50,000 horse {pvpiov9 fiey Ill THE CASE FOR EPHORUS 55 imrihy 7r€VTaKi, In Diodorus, on the other hand, he acts in obedience to a signal from Agesilaus : Kal tov ava€povTo tol9 7ro\€/iLOL9. Diodorus' descrip- tions of battles are notoriously conventional, and his phraseology is also conventional — most conventional, perhaps, when he is describing his favourite device of an ambush. I think we may safely treat this detail in Diodorus as part of his stock-in-trade. After all, he is here compressing into two or three lines what occupies a dozen or a score in P. So far we have encountered nothing that is insuper- able. But we now come to a discrepancy which is of a more serious character. In Diodorus three lines are devoted to a description of the plunder of the napaSeia-o? of Tissaphernes in the neighbourhood of Sardis, and Meyer is certainly within his right in saying that there is no trace of this to be found in P. To this Judeich replies that it need not have occupied more than a couple of lines in P. ; and with that I entirely agree. Diodorus does sometimes, when he gets a favourite subject, expand it. But though it need not have occupied more than a couple of lines in P., I should have been better pleased if Judeich had indicated the position of those two lines. It is just possible that room might be found for a brief reference to the irapdSuaos in the very fragmentary passage^ in which the words ov\8ev dXX' rj tov 7roT[afjL6v occur ; referring, of course, to Agesilaus' advance along the banks of the Hermus. If, however, this should be judged impossible, then I admit that it is a substantial argument against the identity of P. with Ephorus. It would be, to my mind, the most substantial argument that has yet been advanced. One would have to fall back on the explana- tion, not an impossible, but not a very probable, ^ VI. 3, col. V, line 42. in THE CASE FOR EPHORUS 57 explanation, that Diodorus had transferred to this passage a description of the ravaging of the wapddiiao^ that had occurred elsewhere. The second passage in which coincidences are to be traced between Ephorus and P. occurs in the description of the plot against Tissaphernes and his execution.^ It follows in P. immediately on the description of Agesilaus* victory at Sardis. Here we are dealing with a compressed account in Diodorus and with an extremely fragmentary one in P. In P., the most we can hope for is to find a line or two perfect ; as a rule we must be content with a word here and a word there. This makes the coincidences the more remarkable. First of all, in Diodorus, as in P., the incident follows immediately on Agesilaus' campaign. In Diodorus, Artaxerxes is said to have been incited by his mother, Parysatis. The Editors think it probable that the first syllable of her name is to be recognized in col. vii. 15.^ Next follows in Diodorus the statement that Artaxerxes TTpoy Ta9 TToXei? kol tov9 aaTpdira^ €7r€fjL-\fr€v cTTiOToXay : in P.,3 dviwe/jLylrep imaToXd? occurs a few lines later on. In the next sentence in Diodorus, Ariaeus is mentioned as the agent of Tithraustes. Similarly, in P. the name of Ariaeus occurs in the next line.^ Again, in Diodorus narrative, Tissaphernes was seized in his bath. In P.^ ifjLaTia are mentioned, and in the next line . . .]vou v tou npos tovs '^EXXrjvas TToXe/jLOu, hi op-yfis €tx€ tov TL(T(Ta(j)epvriv. Tovtov yap aiTLOv TOV woXefjLov yeyovkvai vTreXafM^ave* Kal inro r^y fjL7]Tpbs Se napvadTiSos tJv -q^KOjxevos TLficoprja-aa-OaL tov TL(raa(j>€pvr}V' el^e yap avTrj 8ia(j)6p(i)S TTpbs avTOv, kK tov SiaPe^XrjKei^aL tov vibv avTrJ9 J^vpou, 6t€ ttjv kirl tov d8eX(j)0v aTpaTeiav kiroteiTo, KaTaarTrjaas ovv TiOpava-Trjv rjyepova, tovtco fiev TTaprjyyeiXe (TvXXaiJLpdvciv Tiaraacpipvrjv, 7rpo9 Se ray 7r6Xei9 Kal tov9 (TaTpdna^ circixvl/cv tiriCTToXds, otto)? Trarrey tovt(o ttolSxtl TO irpoarTaTTopevov. * O 8e TiBpava-Tr]^ irapayevofxevos e/y KoXocro-ay xfjs ^pu^ias, (TUVcXapc tov TL(T[€pv W *ApTa|]^p|[ . . .]8ia[ ]airap[ . . .]Ao[ ]/ca[. .]oiT€[ ] . a'a[ • • ']^9y[ ] ^^"^^ '^^Trjy[.] . a[.]a Sl[ . . .](ra[. . .]t€ PacriXev? 6fjLoXoyovuT[ . .] fid\ia'T[a . . .] Si[a Ti(r]epur}[ ] €7r[ ]o 7rpo9 Mc . [. .]aiou m a . [ ] 0-7 . [. . . .]Xap€tv e/ceX[. . .]aLS[ ] Col. viii. • • 'K ypo[ K * -^pTaii^pi ]Ta r)fi€pa[9 ] avTou a[ ^pDJ-yias €7rfa[ ] tou Ti6p[av(rrr}i/ Tia-v [ ] . e fia^i ] ro) TL6pa[v(rTri ](r[.] «£ Trapa[ ] knLcrTo\a[^ ] TT/ooy t^v a[ ]TLas Kara . [ ] . e MiXrila-L ]\/ray Kal Ta ,[ Ka]TTip€V €ls [ ] ' Apiatov €[ iie\Ta 8e Tav[Ta ] 8iaTpiP(i)[v ] l^JidTia t[ ]vov o'Uvap[Tra ] Kal fi€Ta7r[ ]\ot . v inln ] crvi/€)([ ]fi€v . [ ]Trjs 8[ ] eAey[e ] t[o]v pau ^ AyrjaiXdov ttjv Aaiau nop- 60VVT09 €7r€L(T€ TOP Uipatjif y^pvcrtov TrifjLyjraL tol9 8T]fiaya>yot9 Todv 7r6\^v ^YXXrjvoav. 6 8e firjSei^ {fTriSS/ievo? to jiev aTpaToneSov KaTiXiTTCv kv XdpSeaip, avTos Sh fiera TpLaKooricov XoydSoav ^ApKd8a>v Kal MlXtjo-icov d(f)LK6ii€vos kv * Apiaioi) KarcXvcv ^^7 Se irepl XovTpov e^^aav tov aKLvdKrjv dnedeTo. * Kpiaio^ fieToc Toov OepairevTTJpcov (rvvapirdoras avTov, Kadeip^a? e/y apfidfia^av KaT€ppafjLnkv7]v dyuv TiOpava-Tr} wapiScoKev. 6 Se p.^XP'- P-^^ KeXaiva^v kyKUTCppappevov ijyayev, kvTavOa 8e diroT€[id)V avTOu TT|V K€<|>aXTiv dveKOfJUo-c pao-iXct. ^aa-iXevs Se eirepyjre tt} firjTpl napucdTLSt, rj pdXia-Ta kcrnovSdKa Tiaaa-dat Ti(ra(l)ipvr}y kirl TTJ Kvpov TeXevTrj. The account, it will be seen, is fuller than the account in Diodorus, with the result that the coincidences between Polyaenus and P. are even more striking than those between Diodorus and P. If you read through the a.ccount in Polyaenus side by side with the frag- mentary lines of P., you will see that these fragments suggest that we should find the closest possible corre- spondence between the two narratives, if P. were intact. Book VII, from which this passage comes, deals with (TTpoLTT]yriiiaTa tS>v ^ap^dpcov. Melber had a theory as to this book which the coincidence between P. and this passage proves to be erroneous. He thought that this passage, in common with a great number of other passages in this book, was derived from an author who wrote at least a century later than Ephorus. He is not, liowever, very confident about his hypothesis, and, as a matter of fact, he 1 Polyaen. VII. 16. 1. Cf. Diod. XIV. 80. 6-8, and P. viii. 1, 2 (col. vii, viii). Ill THE CASE FOR EPHORUS 66 is disposed to attribute to Ephorus a crTpaTrjyrjfjLa which occurs a page or two beyond this particular one, and relates to the same period. The hypothesis is clearly incorrect; it is quite clear that Polyaenus either followed Ephorus for this period in Book VII, as he followed him elsewhere, or else followed P., whoever P. was, if he were not Ephorus. The third passage^ which I propose to discuss is one in which the closest possible coincidence can be traced, not indeed between Polyaenus and P., but between Polyaenus and Diodorus. It relates to the dispatch of Herippidas to Heraclea, in the year 399. The passage is of great importance, because it relates to an event which must have been narrated in Book XVIII of Ephorus, the very book we are concerned with.^ As the account in Polyaenus occupies no more than seven lines, and in Diodorus no more than six, you must not expect too much. What degree of coincidence do we find ? Here are the parallel accounts. Polyaenus II. 21. Diodorus XIV. 38. 4. ^BpLirmSa? d<|)iK6|i€vos €ls *Ev *HpaKX€ia 8e rf ircpl *HpdK\€iav TT^v Tpaxiviav, Tpa^Xva aTdaecDS yiuofieur]?, o-uva-ya-Ycav kKK\r\(Tiav, irepi- 'HpLwiriSav e^eTrcfiyj/au Aa/ce- CTTJcras Tovs oirXiras eKrjpv^e SaifiovLOL KaTaaT-qarovTa ra ToijsTpayLVLOvs KaOia-ai'^copcs. irpdyixaTa, ^Oy 'irapa'Y€v6|JL€- oi /lev kKoiBLaav' 6 8k eKeXevcrev vos €ls' HpdK\€iav,o'i)VTi'YO''Y€V aifTovs, Tr€pl «v dSiKOilcri, €ls cKKX-ndiav to, ttXtjOtj, koI AaKeSaifiovioL? Kpiaiu vno- ircptoTTJo-as €V TOis OTrXots, a-^^eiVy coy vofjLifjLoi/ kariv kv rfj avvkXafie Toiis alriovs, Kcd ^napTLdTiSi, SedivTa?, eTrel irdvTas dvciXcv, ovra^ Trepl Se vno Tcov ottXitooj/ SeOevres rnvTaKoaiovs . €^0) 7rvXa>v rj^Oija-av, Kal Brj 'irdvT€S dyxip^Srio-av. ' Polyaen. II. 21 ; Diod. XIV. 38. 4. ' It is narrated by Diodorus immediately after the campaign of Thibron. 66 THE CASE FOR EPHOEUS in I can hardly conceive of a correspondence that could be closer.^ It is quite clear that here, as in the other two passages, we are compelled to choose between two alternative hypotheses. One hypothesis is simplicity itself. The correspondence between Diodorus and P. is explained by the fact that Diodorus was excerpting Ephorus, and Ephorus is P. ; the correspondence between Diodorus and Polyaenus is to be explained by the fact that both were following one and the same authority, and that authority was Ephorus ; and the correspondence between Polyaenus and P. is to be explained by the fact that Polyaenus was, at one and the same time, excerpting Ephorus and P. What is the other alternative 1 To assume that both Ephorus and Polyaenus excerpted P., P. being Theopompus, or anybody else you please ; that they not only selected the same incidents, but that they preserved precisely the same phrases ; and the work was done so mechani- cally that even in Diodorus, at third hand, the very phrases used by P. can clearly be detected. Was this, as a matter of fact, the way in which Ephorus worked ? That is a question which, I think, can be answered by turning to certain passages in Book VIII of Thucydides, and to the corresponding narratives in Diodorus. Schwartz has maintained that Ephorus' work may be divided into two clearly defined parts : the first part in which he was following Thucydides (and, of course, Herodotus before him), and following him very closely ; and the second part which begins where Thucy- ^ I must confess that the grave discrepancies which Meyer detects appear to me to be quite imaginary : e. g. ol Tpa^tViot in the one, a o-Tao-is among the TpaxtVtot in the other. The excessively compressed character of both versions must be taken into account. Ill THE CASE FOR EPHORUS 67 elides ends. In regard to this second part, Schwartz, writing in 1907, a year before the Papyrus was published, says, 'It is wholly inconceivable that Ephorus could have foUowed any other authority for this later period, either to the same extent, or in the same manner, as he followed Thucydides for the earlier period/ With that verdict I have no quarrel; where I venture to differ from him is as to the point at which we are to draw the line. The real line of division occurs, not at the end of Book VIII of Thucy- dides, as he assumes, but at the end of Book VII. This is a conclusion which follows from a comparison of two passages in Diodorus and Thucydides. The passages which we can| compare relate to the battle of Oropus, just before the fall of the Four Hundred, and the battle of Cynossema.^ In Diodorus account of the battle of Oropus (it is a very brief account ; only two or three lines) what is insisted upon is the dissension between the two Athenian commanders. Of that there is nothing in Thucydides ; and necessarily so, because he mentions only one commander. Clearly then the account in Ephorus was widely different from the account in Thucy- dides. In regard to the battle of Cynossema, we must distinguish between the antecedents and consequents of the battle and the battle itself. The antecedents and consequents present a general resemblance to the narra- tive of Thucydides, except that in the antecedents there are some serious discrepancies from Thucydides. Not only is the part played by Tissaphernes in Thucydides attributed to Pharnabazus (that is common to all this part of Diodorus' narrative ^), but in Diodorus there is * Thucyd. VIII. 95 ; cf. Diod. XIII. 36. 3, 4. Thucyd. VIII. 103-6 ; cf. Diod. XIII. 39, 40. ' The blunder may be Diodorus' own. E 2 68 THE CASE FOR EPHORUS iii mention of a squadron dispatched to Rhodes under Dorieus about which Thucydides says nothing, and the positions assigned to the divisions of Thrasyllus and Thrasybulus are reversed. In the account of the battle itself, however, there is no resemblance between the version of Diodorus and the version of Thucydides. The central feature in Diodorus' narrative is the current between Sestos and Abydos ; in Thucydides, it is the promontory of Cynossema. In Diodorus, all turns upon the skill of the Athenian Kvpepvrjrai^ and the victory is determined by the sudden appearance round a headland of an Athenian reinforcement of twenty-five vessels. Thucydides knows nothing of this reinforce- ment, or of the skill of the Athenian Kv^epvijTai. He attributes the victory to the disorganization of the Peloponnesian fleet, the result of their initial success. Thus we see that, even in a period that falls within the compass of Thucydides' work, Ephorus departed entirely from the version of his main authority in his description of the only two battles by which we can judge him ; the only two, that is, which are narrated by Diodorus between the Sicilian expedition and the point at which Thucydides breaks off. Yet we are asked to believe that, when Ephorus is following, not the master Thucydides, but the hypotheti- cal disciple Theopompus, and when he is describ- ing military operations, he followed the disciple so servilely, and so mechanically, that the very expressions used by Theopompus can still be de- tected in the meagre epitome of Diodorus! And here we cannot fall back on the h3^othesis that Ephorus is dependent on Theopompus. The latter's starting- point .excludes Cynossema, as well as Oropus, from his Hellenica. The evidence of Diodorus on this Ill THE CASE FOR EPHORUS 69 point is, it is true, contradictory. On the one hand,* he states that Xenophon and Theopompus began where Thucydides left oif (Hcj/o^v Sk koI QeSTro/Mno^ deft hv dirkXin^ QovKv8i8r]S t^v dp)(fju neTToirjuTai) — a statement which is absolutely accurate as regards the Hellenics of Xenophon ; on the other,^ he gives the battle of Cynos- sema as the point at which Theopompus narrative commenced : 6 Se a-vyypaep^vs oivTos rjpKTat pikv dirh Trj9 nept Kvvh9 arjjia t/avfia^ias, e/y fjv (E>ovKv8i8r]9 KariXri^e t^v TT/oay- liantav. The key is supplied by the anonymous author of a life of Thucydides,^ who tells us that Thucydides stopped at the battle of Cynossema, and left it to Xenophon and Theopompus to narrate the rest of the War : ra 8\ fiera ravra iripoi^ ypdcpeiv /careXtTre, 'B^voj>SiVTi KOL Q€07r6fL7rvLov,^ as an argument for Ephorus, may fairly be set against Ka/jTrao-evy/ as an argument for Theopompus ; for it may be inferred with certainty from Stephanus of Byzantium,^ on the one hand, that Ephorus used the form 'AKpaivLa^ he cannot have written chapter xi of P. It is not, of course, decisive in favour of Ephorus, because the form ^ AKpaL(j)VLov may have been employed by Cratippus or by other writers ; it is, however, extremely strong evidence in his favour. Secondly, I would call attention to two phrases which occur in the description of the proceedings of Demaenetus, at the very beginning of the Papyrus. He is said to have acted [ov fiera r^y tov] Srjfiov yvatfJLr]?, and K0ivco(rdp.€vo[9 ev] dnoppriTco rfj PovXrj. The first phrase finds a parallel * GriecJiische Gesclikhte, Bd. i, p. 157 (2nd ed.). 2 Klio, viii. ' Hell Oxyrh, xi. 3. * Hell. Oxyrh. xv. 1. ^ *AKpai<^ta, iroAis Boiwruis. 72 THE CASE FOR EPHORUS in in two passages in Diodorus.^ The first of these relates to the Athenian general Chabrias, who is said to have accepted the command of the Egyptian army dv^v rrjs tov SrjfjLov yvdofirj9. The second refers to Sphodrias, who is stated to have been persuaded by Cleombrotus to attempt his raid duev t^s yvoofirj? t5)v €' ov ffiacnv *A\e$avSpov ciS rqv *Acriav Stafirjvaij ws fikv 4>ai'tas, €rr) eTrraKocria ScKaTrcvrc, ws Bk £^o/x)9, iTrraKocia rpidKovra vevTif 0)5 §€ TifULios Koi K\€LTap\o^, oKTaKoaia tiKoai, ws 8c *^paToa-6€vijs , iTrraKoaia (/SSopLi^KOVTa riircrapa. 86 THE CASE AGAINST EPHORUS EXAMINED iv ing from the Heturn of the Heraclidae, inckided in his work about 750 years, down to the siege of Perinthus (341/40).^ If this statement, therefore, is correct, Ephorus should have reckoned 756 years, and not 735, from the Beturn of the Heraclidae to Alexander's Sidfiaa-i?, Clement may be a good authority, but Diodorus' chronological source is a still better one. The statements which Diodorus derives from it can be shown to be correct in the great majority of instances ; in particular, the statements about historians and the compass of their works are invariably correct. At any rate, we are at liberty for the moment to presume that the statement in Diodorus is as likely to be correct as the statement in Clement. And it will presently be seen that the statement in Diodorus is certainly correct, and that consequently the statement in Clement is certainly incorrect. The indirect arguments are connected with one of the most famous problems of Greek historiography, the problem of harmonizing two statements in Book XVI of Diodorus,^ both of which are derived from his chronological authority. In the first passage it is stated that Demophilus, the son of Ephorus, composed a history of the Sacred War, which had been omitted by his father, and that he took as his starting-point the seizure of the temple at Delphi by Phikmelus : Tai' ^e (rvyypa(f>i(i>v Atj^locPlXo^ fiev 6 ^F^cpopov toG Io-to- pioypd6opd9 tS>v Siav€ifiafjLiv€V €19 T^V HcpiudoV TToXlOpKiaV 7r€pl€[\r](p€ Sk TTJ ypacpfi 7rpd^€i9 rds re roor 'F,\\rjVcop kol Pappdp(oy, dp^dp.evo9 dnb rrjs Ta>y 'HpaKXeiSan/ Ka66Sov» ^povov Sk TrepiiXafie a^eSoi^ hoou iiTTaKoaicov Kal TrevrriKOPTa, /cat Pl^Xovs yiypa(f)€ TpidKOVTa, irpooifiLou eKda-TTj irpoO^is. A passage in Athenaeus ^ renders it certain that the work of Demophilus was reckoned as the thirtieth book of Ephorus ; i. e. that twenty-nine books only were from the pen of Ephorus himself. Two explanations, and two only, are possible. The first is that Ephorus carried his work down to the siege of Perinthus, in 341/40, but that he had omitted the Sacred War from his narrative, and the omission was supplied by his son Demophilus. This is the explanation given by Niese and Laqueur.2 The other explanation, that given by Schwartz, is that Ephorus carried his narrative down to the seizure of the Delphic temple by Philomelus in the year 357/6, and that Demophilus thirtieth book was a continuation of Ephorus' work, from the outbreak of the Sacred War to the siege of Perinthus. ' Athenaeus, VI. 232 D (= Ephorus, Fragm. 155) ""Rt^po^ ^ i\r}fx6r)(TLV. ^ Busolt's view is substantially the same : Griech. GescJu Bd. i, pp. 155-6 (2nd ed.). 88 THE CASE AGAINST EPHORUS EXAMINED iv Laqueur^ bases his case upon the following arguments. Firstly, Diodorus' words clearly imply that Demo- philus' work was confined to a history of the Sacred War; tov irapa\€iv BofoTcoj')?2 This argument does not appear to be conclusive. In the first place, in a writer who is so discursive as P. it is dangerous to argue that he must have introduced any particular piece of information at any particular place ; and such an ' In Lecture III. ' Thuc. V. 38. i^ Tlie QABE AGAINST EPHORUS EXAMINED iv argument is peculiarly dangerous when applied to an ancient historian.^ Secondly, we must remember the difference in the scale of Ephorus' narrative before and after the end of the Sicilian expedition. Thirdly, of course, the objection would disappear if we accept the theory that Ephorus' history of the fourth century was written first, and the earlier history, down to the year 411, was written later; i.e. that he began with contemporary history, and then conceived the idea of entering upon a universal history. I will not insist upon this, however, because I do not think that this theory can be proved. A second objection is connected with the eVoy 6y8oov in chapter iv. It is argued that this year, whatever year it was, whether 403/2 or 402/1, must have marked an epoch for the author of this work ; and not only must it have marked an epoch, but it must have also marked the beginning of a new section of his history. We are at liberty to assume this of the Hellenica of Theopompus, because the fragments are so few that we may assume almost anything; but we cannot assume it of Ephorus. A similar objection has been based on the commencement of the Papyrus, which has been held (e. g. by the Editors) to indicate that a new book, or a new part of the work, began where the Papyrus itself begins. Book X of Theopompus may conceivably have begun there, but Book XYIII of ^ Thucydides is far from being a discursive writer ; yet no one would have expected antecedently that a digression on Harmodius and Aristogiton would find a place in the story of the Sicilian expedition. We shall do well to remember the fallacious argu- ments which have been based on his silence as to the increase of the <^opos in 425. His omission to mention it in the history of that year is almost incomprehensible ; but the solid fact is that he does omit it. IV THE CASE AGAINST EPHORUS EXAMINED 108 Ephorus cannot conceivably have done so. I cannot attach as much value as most critics attach to the objection which is based on the (^tos SySooy. The passage is so much mutilated that we cannot determine to what it refers; all that we can say is that the year 403/2 (or the year 402/1) is a most extraordinary moment to choose for one's era. The argument may be allowed to have some weight, as advanced by those who hold (as Mr. Underbill does) that P. began at the point from which the croy 6y8oov is reckoned ; but it has very little force as advanced by those who identify P. with Theo- pompus, because they have to postulate, without the least shadow of evidence, that at that very year Theopompus made a great division of his work into two parts, and made a fresh start. In a sense, the argument from the beginning of the Papyrus is destructive of the argument from the eroy 6y8oou, We may argue that a new book began at chapter iv, with the summer of the eighth year {toO [B]ipov9 rfj /iku [ . . . . . . . .] €Toy 6ySoov) ; or we may argue that a new book began at the beginning of section A of the Papyrus : we cannot argue both things at once. If a new book began at chapter iv, a new book did not begin at the beginning of section A ; if it began at the beginning of section A, it did not begin at chapter iv. And, after all, what is the evidence that Ephorus' seventeenth book, the book that preceded the eighteenth, did not begin in 403/2, or in 402/1 '? It is invariably assumed that it began at the end of the Peloponnesian War, on the strength of the passage in Diodorus^ in which it is stated that Ephorus narrated the death of Alcibiades in his seventeenth book. As the death of Alcibiades » Diod. XIV. 11. 2. 104 THE CASE AGAINST EPHORUS EXAMINED iv occurred in 404/3, it is commonly inferred that Ephorus' seventeenth book must have begun before the end of that year, which would almost certainly imply that it began immediately after the end of the Pelo- ponnesian War. A comparison, however, of this passage with the opening words in chapter 22 of the same book suggests that the death of Alcibiades was narrated as an episode in the story of the Ten Thousand.^ Consequently, if it were essential, though I maintam it is not essential, to assume that Book XVII of Ephorus began in the year 403/2, this particular passage would not stand in the way of the assumption. The answer to the question where Book XVII began depends upon the answer to another question, that of the length of Ephorus narrative of the march of the Ten Thousand. Closely connected with the last argument is an objection which I can anticipate, though I am not aware that it has been formulated. It may be asked how we can assign to Book XIX of Ephorus a range of subject which would be consistent at once with the limits which have been assumed, and with the scale of treatment which has been postulated, for Book XVIII. If the latter book ended with the recall of Agesi- laus, Book XIX must have started with the spring, or early summer, of 394 ; it must have included Nemea and Agesilaus' homeward march, as well as Coronea and Cnidus. The terminus ad quern is usually found in the Peace of Antalcidas, on the strength of two fragments, 138 and 136. From the former of these it ^ Compare the words at the beginning of XIV. 22 6 8e ^aa-iXivs 'Apra^cp^S Kttl TraXat /jlcv tjv irapa ^apvafid^ov 7r€7rv(rfji4vov KOLvSiv II \prinaTL^ia6aL — prove him, according to Meyer,^ to have been, not only no Athenian, but no friend to the Athenian cause. He hated Athens, and he judged her statesmen more harshly than those of other states : ' ganz greif bar tritt hervor, dass er fur Athen kein Herz hat, vielmehr diesen Staat hasst. Daher beurteilt er es viel gehassiger, als die anderen Staaten u. s. w.' Few, I fancy, will agree with this. The writer is only repeat- ing a commonplace of Greek political Uterature ; the motives which he ascribes are similar to those which Thucydides ascribes to Cleon. The commonplace may be unsound, but it was, at any rate, not more unjust to the Athenian democracy than the similar commonplace which satisfied Ephorus.^ The sentence in question, so far from being a * stone of stumbling ', is one argument the more in favour of Ephorus. It is exactly such a sentence as he might have penned. And Meyer is forced to admit that in the preceding chapter full justice is done to the policy of the moderate party and its leaders, Anytus and Thrasybulus. What is true of this particular objection holds good of the writer's political sympathies generally. The views expressed, and the attitude assumed, are just what we shoiJd ' Hell Oxyrh. ii. 2. ^ Theopomps Hellenika, pp. 51, 52. Diod. XII. 39. 3 *0 8c TlepiKk^^, €i8o>s tov Brjpov ev pkv toi? TToXe/xiKotf c/jyois OavpAi^ovTa rovs ayaOov^ avSpa? Sia ra? KaT€ir€iyov06vov. 108 THE CASE AGAINST EPHORUS EXAMINED iv expect in a writer like Ephorus, who is * ohne Leiden- schaft '. Schwartz insists on the impartiality of Ephorus in much the same terms as those in which the Editors insist on the absence of bias in P. The latter's attitude towards Athenian parties is thoroughly Iso- cratean; the favourable judgement on Thrasybulus and Anytus, which is implied in his description of their policy, recalls the equally favourable judgement on the policy of the ' moderates ' at the time of the Thirty which is passed by the author of the 'Adrji/atcov There remains one more argument to be considered ; an argument for which, I fear, I am myself in some sense responsible. In my article in Klio ^ I argued that the chronological errors in Diodorus' narrative of the years 398 to 395, especially his errors in regard to the naval operations, render it difficult to suppose that he was following, at first hand, a waiter so precise in his marks of time as P. I am no longer disposed to attach much weight to this objection. So long as Diodorus is content to excerpt, he is capable of preserving the correct order and the correct dates ; when, however, he attempts to condense and combine, he is entering on a path beset with perils. His narrative of the year 394 shows him at his best ; and here he is merely excerpting. On the whole, he comes out well for the year 395 ; but even here, in his attempt to combine the origin of the Boeotian War with its subsequent course down to the battle of Haliartus, he is led to omit the autumn campaign of Agesilaus. Experience shows that Diodorus is most likely to fall into chronological confusions where ^ 34. 3. Anytus is mentioned as one of the leaders of the party in this passage, as well as in P. ^ Klio, viii, p. 362. See also Oxyrhynchus Papyri, vol. v, p. 137, IV THE CASE AGAINST EPHORUS EXAMINED 109 lie has to find room for Sicilian history. This is pre- cisely what has happened here. Between his last notice of the war in Asia Minor (the truce between Dercylidas and the Persian satraps) and his resumption of the story with the arrival of Agesilaus at Ephesus, he has inserted fifty-seven pages of Sicilian history, which exclusively occupy the Attic years 398/7 and 397/6, with the result that his narrative of the operations in Asia has undergone a serious dislocation. This disloca- tion is apparent in the naval warfare, both from the mention of Pharax as being still vavapxos late in 396, and from the fact that the number of ships under Conon's command in 396/5 is the same as it was in 399/8. In order to find room for his Sicilian digression, he was compelled to attempt contraction and compression on so large a scale that, not unnaturally, he failed to find his place, just as, with far less excuse, he failed to find it in 356. It looks as if no note of time, however definite, could keep Diodorus from error. The dates of the outbreak of the Third Messenian War and of the Five Years' Truce must have been correctly given by his chronographical authority ; yet he puts the former four or five, and the latter three or four years too early. To infer the dates from P. requires, after all, rather more intelligence than to look them up in a Dictionary of Dates. So far as I am aware, no other objections have been advanced which call for notice. Some of the objections have turned out, upon examination, to afford arguments in favour of Ephorus. This is true both of the date and of the political sympathies. Others have been proved to have no weight; e.g. those based on the npooifiia. There remain a few which must be admitted to con- stitute diflSculties in the way of the proposed identifica- 110 THE CASE AGAINST EPHORUS EXAMINED iv tion ; they do not, however, seem to me to constitute, either singly or cumulatively, difficulties which are insuperable. When compared, either with the argu- ments in favour of Ephorus, or with the arguments against Theopompus, they appear, I will not say, insignificant, but, at any rate, slight. LECTURE V THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE Perhaps the most striking feature in the narrative of P. is its entire independence of that which is given by Xenophon in his Hellenics, It would doubtless be an exaggeration to assert that nothing is common to the two beyond the period which they cover, but it would be a pardonable exaggeration. It is not merely that there is so much in P. to which there is nothing correspond- ing in Xenophon (roughly speaking, three-fifths of the whole) ; what is still more surprising is that, where the events are common to the two narratives, the differ- ence in the two accounts far outweigh the agreements. Hence the question of the credibility of P.'s statements is one that imperatively calls for an answer, and the answer must affect not only the credibility of P. ; it must affect, and very closely affect, the credibility of Xenophon, one of our three principal authorities for the Great Age of Greek History. It is a question to which widely divergent answers have been given. Judeich accepts almost everything; Busolt accepts almost nothing. In between these extreme views come those of Meyer and the Editors, which agree, at any rate, in their insistence on the value of the major part of our new information. That there should be not only divergence but con- tradiction between the two historians is, in reality, not at all surprising ; rather, it is just what we might have expected. The divergencies and contradictions are 112 THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE v perhaps greater, but they are much of the same kind as those which are disclosed by a comparison of the 'ABrjyauoy IIoXiTeia, either with Thucydides' account of the Four Hundred, or with Xenophon's account of the Thirty. It is not the least important result of the literary finds of the last quarter of a century that we are beginning to realize that our certitude in regard to the details of Ancient History is largely an illusion. The great historians have gone uncontradicted, because there was commonly no other authority, of at all the same rank, with which to confront them. But where comparison was possible divergencies and contradictions were at once apparent. It is seldom that a comparison between Herodotus and Thucydides is possible, but there are a few cases where we can set side by side their respective versions of events of which they were, more or less, the contem- poraries. Let us take three of them — the unsuccessful attempt to plant an Athenian colony at Ennea Hodoi in 465, the Theban attack on Plataea which precipitated the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War, and the arrest of the Spartan envoys to the Persian court in the second year of the War. The reference to the first of these events is a very brief one in Herodotus — less than three lines; the references in Thucydides are slightly fuller — six lines in the one passage, and three lines in the other. Yet there are two contradictions on essential points between the two versions of the story. In Herodotus the scene of the disaster is Datus, and the assailants are the Edonians {dnodaveLi' virb ^ll8a>vmv kv AaTO)) ; in Thucydides the scene is Drabescus, and the assailants are ' all the Thraoians ', though both Ennea Hodoi and Drabescus are in Edonian territory (TrpoeX- ^ Herod. IX. 75 ; Thucyd. I. 100 ; IV. 102. V THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE 113 $6vT€9 8^ TTJ9 &paKr}9 €y fi€u 0paKcop ^vinravTcav). The site of Drabescus is more or less agreed on, but Datus, or Datum, is a puzzle. If Strabo is correct in placing it on the coast, the contradiction involved is a glaring one. It is, however, usual to prefer the authority of Harpo- cration, Ephorus, and Appian, and to identify it with the later Philippi ; and, on the strength of Scylax, to assume that Datus was not founded till 360, and con- sequently that in the time of Herodotus it was a district, and not a town. Even if all this were granted, it certainly does not follow that it was a district which included Drabescus. There is little evidence to prove that Drabescus was in the territory of the AaTTjvoi in the time of Herodotus, or of the disaster, or that the district of Datus extended so far to the north. Strabo, if he is to count at all, seems to imply that the AarrjuoL extended southward, toward the sea, rather than northward.^ In the two accounts of the Theban attack on Plataea ^ (a full account in Thucydides, a mere passing reference in Herodotus) there is a discrepancy as to the commanders of the force. In Herodotus its commander is Eurymachus ; in Thucydides he is only the intermediary in the plot (npos bv iirpa^av ol npoSiSovreij, while the commanders are two instead of one, Pythan- gelus and Diemporus. Our third instance is connected with one of the most famous passages in Herodotus, the Wrath of Talthybius.^ In Herodotus the envoys are three in number, in Thucydides they are six ; in * Strabo VII. 331, Fragm. 36 ; Harpocration, Aaro's ; Appian, Bell Civ. IV. 105 ; Scylax, 68 ; Isocrates, de Pace, 86 (cv Aarw Bk fivpiov^ oTrXiTas avToiv koI ruiv crvfj.fxd)(0}v aTrwAccrav). 2 Herod. VII. 233 ; Thucyd. II. 2. '' Herod. VII. 137 ; Thucyd. II. 67. 114 THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE v Herodotus they are betrayed by Sitalces and Nympho- dorus, in Thucydides by Sadocus, at the instigation of the Athenian envoys, while Nymphodorus is not mentioned ; lastly, Thucydides makes no mention of Bisanthe (the modern Rodosto), which is given by Herodotus as the scene of their capture. It would be hardly fair to instance the variations between Thucy- dides' account of the conspiracy of Harmodius and Aristogiton and the version found in the ' KOrivalonv IIoXtTeia, for here we are concerned with events which were, in no sense of the term, contemporary. It is more relevant to instance the discrepancies between the two accounts of the Revolution of the Four Hundred. The point is not whether Thucydides is right or wrong ; it is that between the two accounts, one the narrative of a contemporary and the other a narrative based upon contemporary documents, there exist divergencies and contradictions which are fundamental. I am disposed to accept, in great part, Meyer's vindication of Thucydides' version ; the fact remains, however, that Thucydides cannot be acquitted of an error which is grave, and of the omission of a detail which is essential to the understanding of the movement. He has omitted all reference to the scheme of the 'moderates', the iroXiTda e/s Tov fjLeXXouTa xpoi^ov ; he has given the number of the |yyypa0€ry as 30, in place of 10, and he has failed to connect them with the irpoPovXoL appointed two years before. It is a still harder task to harmonize Xenophon's account of the Thirty with the story as told in the 'AOrjvaicov YloXnda, and possibly it is not so easy to rescue his reputation ; but here again this is not the point. What concerns us is the presence in the two accounts of inconsistencies which are at once serious and frequent. It is not, of course, necessary to conclude V THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE 115 that either Herodotus or Thucydides, Xenophon or the authority followed by Aristotle, was dishonest, in- competent, or careless. Thucydides, it may be granted, was more competent and more careful than his pre- decessor; but it will go badly with us if we are to demand a better authority than Herodotus. Thucydides himself knew well enough that it is no easy matter to ascertain the truth ; even the evidence of eyewitnesses is not always consistent, for men's memories are weak, and their prejudices are strong : imrrovcos Sk rjifpuTK^To^ SioTi ol 7rap6vT€9 ToTs €pyoLS iKcia-TOL? ov ravTa nepl tS>v airrSiV 4\€yov, dW Q)y iKaripcov tis evpoias rj fjLvrjfirjs €)(^oi. And, we may add, the incidents and events which history has to record are infinitely complex. What different accounts two eyewitnesses, equally honest and equally competent, will give of so simple an event as an accident P A fortiori this holds good of a battle or a campaign, of a political intrigue or the course of a revolution. There is something almost naive in Busolt's alternatives, his * Entweder ' and * Oder ' ^ ; history is, often enough, too subtle for the art of the historian : * subtilitati rerum longe impar.' ^ In dealing with the question of authorship, we found it necessary to begin by a critical examination of the assumptions which had hitherto barred the way to an impartial consideration of the claims of Ephorus. In dealing with the question of authority, it is equally necessary to begin by disposing of an assumption — the assumption of Xenophon's infallibility. Xenophon was * Let any one try to construct a coherent story of the wreck of the Titanic from the evidence of the survivors. ^ 'Ber netie Historiker und Xenophon,* Hermes, xliii (1908), p. 260, ' Cf. Bacon, Novum Organum, i. 13 ' Syllogismus subtilitiiti naturae longe impar '. h2 116 THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE y an eyewitness of much of what he records ; but, as Thncydides warns us, eyewitnesses are not exempt from error. And Xenophon was competent, in the sense that he was an expert in military affairs. He was competent too in the sense that he possessed the gift of vivid narration. But he is quite capable of omitting details which are essential ; quite capable, that is to say, of telling a story which cannot be understood as it stands ; he was not endowed with much political insight ; and, if he was honest, he was assuredly not free from the bias and prejudices of a partisan. It must be remembered too that the Hellenics were published some forty years after the events with which we are here concerned.^ How far he had taken notes at the time of all the various incidents that he records it is, of course, impossible to determine. It is somewhat sur- prising to find that Busolt, whose decision is wholly in favour of Xenophon as against P., judged very differently, fifteen years ago, as between the claims of Xenophon and the 'KBr)vaL(ov HoXiTua,'^ Xenophon's version may be more correct than Busolt was prepared to allow, but there is good evidence that on some all-important points the account in the 'A6r]vaicov IToXtTefa is to be preferred.^ But we need only turn to the narrative of the battle of Arginusae, or of the Trial of the Generals, to be convinced that he is prone to omit details that are essential. In the battle, there is clearly some omission in the account of the formation of the Athenian line ; he fails to ^ It is not necessary for my present purpose to extend this statement beyond Books III-VII. ' Hermes, xxxiii (1898). •'' e.g. the composition of the Thirty ; the existence from the first of a moderate party in their midst ; the complicity of Theramenes in the proscriptions. V THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE 117 explain how it was that the weak centre, formed in single line, emerged intact and unscathed from the engagement. In the trial, it hardly admits of doubt that the commission given to Theramenes and Thrasy- bulus, suppressed in the dispatch, was disclosed by the generals in their examination before the PouXrj ; Xenophon omits this fact, and thus contrives to convey a most misleading impression as to the conduct of Theramenes. And that is not the worst ; here, at any rate, he is not quite honest ; for in the incident of the sham mourners, who are stated to have been suborned by Theramenes, he has said the thing that is not. It has occurred to no one to claim infallibility for Ephorus. It must be confessed that he comes before us with a tarnished reputation. A writer who could construct such a version of the Eurymedon — who can credit Cimonwith 8vo KaXXia-Tas vUa^ Kara Tr)j/ avTTjv rjfjLipay, the vavjiaxia being off Cyprus and the ncCofiaxia on the banks of the Eurymedon — is a writer who must be viewed with some suspicion. No doubt, he is a much better authority for times nearer his own day ; still, he appears Ho have combined Tissaphernes andPharnabazus into one, to have transferred to the campaign of 399 the achievements of Thibron in 3 91, and to have strangely misconceived the Spartan invasion of Elis just after the end of the Peloponnesian War ; and these are errors which affect a period which comes perilously near to the one with which we are concerned. On the other hand, there is much in Ephorus that is extremely valuable. To him we owe, for instance, our knowledge (so far as it is derived from literary sources) of the Second Athenian Confederacy ; and, as Schwartz has * The confusion may, however, be due to Diodorus. 118 THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE v pointed out, his account of Dion's expedition shows that he knew how to make good use of good material, when it was at hand. In the period with which we are more immediately concerned, the history of the naval operations and of the activities of Conon, as well as the notices of events in Northern Greece, must be counted to his credit. To judge him by his occasional indiscre- tions, however grave they may be, would be to judge him most unfairly. The ancient mind was not indeed favourably impressed by his battle-scenes ; Polybius brings against them the charge of conventionality, and against their author the charge of ignorance of the art of war. If we are called upon to choose between a battle in Xenophon and a battle in Ephorus, we can hardly hesitate. And now let us come to P. What impression does the narrative as a whole leave upon our minds 1 Two things must at once strike us — the abundance of names, and the fullness of geographical detail. The number of persons who are mentioned by name is remarkable, and all, with the exception of a couple of insignificant personages, are, in some sense or other, attested. Among Athenians there are Thrasybulus, Anytus, Aesimus, Demaenetus, Hagnias, Telesegorus, Epicrates, Cephalus, Simichus, Hieronymus, and Nico- phemus, besides Conon. Some of these are sufiSciently obscure, but none of them are phantoms. For Aesimus there is both literary and epigraphic evidence. He led the procession from the Piraeus into Athens upon the conclusion of the 8ia\vcr€L9 after the fall of the Thirty ; ^ he was sent on an embassy, along with Cephalus, in 386, and again in 377.- Demaenetus was crTpaTTjyos in ^ Lysias, in Agoratum, § 80 ff. ' a LA. ii. 15(a); 18 (&) ; 19. V THE CREDIBILITY OB^ THE NARRATIVE 119 Aegina in 387, and later in the same year in the Hellespont;^ his exploit against Chilon, the harmost of Aegina, is referred to by Aeschines.'^ The embassy of Hagnias to the Great King, and his capture and execu- tion by the Spartans, were recorded by Androtion and Philochorus; if we want further evidence, we havelsaeus.^ His colleague, Telesegorus, lacks literary confirmation, but he occurs in inscriptions. An embassy of Epicrates to Sardis, in 391, is mentioned by Lysias,* and Philo- chorus (in the new fragment) has something to say about him. Nicophemus^ is stated by Xenophon to have been harmost of Cythera in 393,and his name occurs in Lysias. Even Simichus and his defeat at Amphipolis are attested by an excellent authority, the scholiast on Aeschines.^ For Conon and Thrasybulus, Anytus and Cephalus, no witnesses need be called. Of the six Thebans who are mentioned by name, three are well enough known — Ismenias, Leontiades, and Androclides ; the other three, Antitheus, Astias, Corrantadas, are all confirmed, in one way or another. Antitheus is obviously a variant of the Amphitheus of Plutarch, and the Amphithemis of Pausanias ;'^ Corrantadas may be recognized in Xenophon's Coeratadas;^ while the name Astias is found in an inscription in its Boeotian form, Faarias. Of all the other names of persons that occur in the fragment, the Spartan vavap^os Chiricrates and one of ' Xen. Hell V. 1. 10 ; V. 1. 26. ^ De Falsa Leg, 78 (niyKarevavfjuaLxqa^i XiAwvcu Cf. Hed. Oxyrh, ch. iii. ' Philoch., Fragm. 153. Cf. Hell Oxyrh. ii. 1 ; Isaeus, xi. 8. ^ Lysias, xxvii. >* Xen. Hell. IV. 8. 8 ; Lysias, xix. 7. « De Falsa Leg, 34 (=HUrs S(mrces, iii. 278). ' Plut. Lysander, 27 ; Paus. III. 9. 8. ** Xen. Hell. I. 3. 15, 21, 22. Koppavrd^s, KotparoSos. 120 THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE v his officers, Pancalus, alone appear to be without confirmation ; except, indeed, Dorimachus, the spokes- man of the mob at Rhodes. The combined effect of all this, it must be allowed, is impressive. When we turn from persons to places, the result is not less satisfactory. The writer seems equally at home in Asia Minor and in Greece ; and in Greece, equally in Attica, Boeotia, and Phocis. The account of the first campaign of Agesilaus is too fragmentary to enable us to estimate the fullness of its topographical detail, but the narrative of the second campaign is singularly rich in this respect. In Boeotia no less than twenty places are named, and in Phocis a good half-dozen. With the life-like description of the raids and reprisals round Mount Parnassus we may compare the picture of rural Attica before the War. The discrepancies which I propose to discuss are those which afiect the first and the second campaigns of Agesilaus in the year 395, and the outbreak of the Boeotian War. The discrepancies which exist between the two accounts of the first campaign extend to the route as well as to the engagement. In Xenophon's version Agesilaus marched to the neighbourhood of Sardis by the most direct route ; Tissaphernes had sent his infantry into Caria, and his cavalry to the Plain of the Maeander ; consequently Agesilaus' march was undis- turbed by the enemy for the first three days ; it was only on the fourth day that he came into touch with the Persian cavalry. In P., when the account begins to be intelligible, Agesilaus' line of march follows the Plain of the Cayster and the mountains (Diodorus enables us to identify ra oprj with Mount Sipylus) : Tissaphernes follows him with a large force, both of V THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE 121 horse and foot (Diodorus gives the numbers as 10,000 cavalry and 50,000 infantry ; in P. they have to be co;i- jecturally restored) ; Agesilaus, in view of the superior forces of the enemy, marches with his troops formed in a hollow square {ev 7r\iv6i(o), The route indicated in Xenophon*s version seems to be the direct road from Ephesus to Sardis, over Mount Tmolus, by Hypa^pa, which was conventionally reckoned as a three days' march. ^ It was the route followed by the Greeks in the Ionic Revolt, and, in the reverse direction, by Alexander. 2 The route indicated in P. would be a much longer one. Agesilaus must have kept much farther to the west, and have marched, either by Smyrna or by a more direct route by Nymphaeum, to the foot of Mount Sipylus, and then advanced on Sardis up the valley of the Hermus. In the actual engagement the result, in the version in P., is made to depend on the success of an ambush ; the Persian force is seized with panic and flees, and Agesilaus sends his cavalry and light-armed troops in pursuit. In Xenophon, on the contrary, there is no ambush ; the Persians with- stand the attack of the Greek cavalry, and only yield before the onset of the infantry. In P., Tissaphernes is present at the engagement ; in Xenophon, he remains in Sardis.^ Where two versions of the same story appear to present a series of discrepancies (and I have selected only the more salient inconsistencies) it seems as if the task of harmonizing them were hopeless ; we must make our choice between the two. Both Meyer and Judeich give their decision in favour of P., chiefly on the ground of the diflSculties which they detect in ' Xen. HeU. III. 2. 11. = Arrian, Anabasis, I. 17. 10. ^ Xen. HelL III. 4. 25 "Ore 8* avn; 17 f-^XH ^^v€to, Tia-€pvq^ 122 THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE v Xenophon's narrative. As to the route, Judeich argues that troops engaged in plundering could not possibly have got from Ephesus to Sardis in three days, seeing that it took Alexander's army, which was much superior in point of training, four days of steady marching ; and he is quite within his rights in calling attention to the vagueness of the terms in which Xenophon expresses what he meant to say : ^ evOif? ety tou ^apSiavou tottov he- fidXc Koi Tpeis fikv rjfjLipa? 8i eprjfiLas TroXefJLicoy 7rop€v6fi€V09 TToWa Ta iTTLTTJSeia rfj crpaTLo. elye, TJj Se rerdpTr} rJKov ol tS)v iroXefii(ov tmrus. What is the point from which the three days are reckoned \ Is it Ephesus, or is it the arrival in the neighbourhood of Sardis? There is a real ambiguity here ; and if this were all that Xenophon told us, it would be natural to treat it as a case of omission — as one of the many instances in which Xenophon has left out a detail which is essential to a correct understanding of the story. But rriv awro- pcoTaTTji/ is fundamental. Agesilaus' object is to steal a march on his adversary ; to reach Sardis before Tissa- phernes has had time to recall his troops from Caria. Xenophon's information may have been incorrect, or his memory may have played him false; he cannot have meant that Agesilaus followed the route ascribed to him in P. I find myself unable to accept Judeich's hypothesis as to the stratagem of Agesilaus, which forms the subject of Polyaenus II. 1. 9.^ He interprets the passage as relating to the moment in Agesilaus' march when he found his advance on Sardis, up the Hermus valley, barred by the army of Tissaphernes. ' Hell III. 4. 21. '^ 'Ayi^o-tAaos ctti ^apScts iXavvatv KaOrJKe XoyoTroiovs, w9 k^airaroiv Ti(Ta€pvrjv a-TeXXcTat fxev ^avcptus cTrt AvSta?, TpcVcTat Sk dcfyavCi}^ iirl Kaptas. rjyyeXr) ravra TL(Taepvrj. 6 ftev Ilcpcnys wpfxrjore Kapiar a(rav twv KOivoiv rrjJvwr, oTrep elwOei (Tvv€8p€V€LV [iv rfj iS-n-dprry] kut c/cctvov tov xpovov. V THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE 129 and the parallel of the Sacred War becomes an argu- ment for P. as against Xenophon. It is in favour of P. that his account is fuller than Xenophons, and that amongst his additional detail is the position of the dfjLcpKr^rjTrja-ifjLos X<^pa. If it is correctly placed mpl tov Uapvaaraovy ccidit quaestio. It may be added that, if P. is Ephorus, the interest which Ephorus evinces in this particular region renders it unlikely that he should have been mistaken. As Judeich has pointed out, it was not only in the Sacred War that the Ozoh'an Locrians are the enemies of the Phocians. The feud between the two states seems to have been perennial. Thucy- dides ^ refers to it as far back as the year 426 : ivviirpaa- Lv ^(oKe(ov eyOo^ SeSiore?. In 421 they are openly at war,- and in 418 Diodorus^ has a decisive victory of the Phocians to report : Kal ^cokcT? yap npo^ AoKpov? Sieye^deyTe^, napard^ei iKpiOrjaav Sta ttju oUeLay dvSpwv epiKTjaay yap ^(ok€ls, dv€\6vT€9 KoKpSiv ttXclovs \lXl(ov, Nor is it incredible that Ismenias should have found agents in Phocis. Whenever we get a glimpse of the internal affairs of this state, we can trace the existence of two parties — in the Persian War,* in the Peloponnesian War,^ in the Sacred War. Phocis was one of tlie less important states, but no state in Greece was too small to support an opposition. And if the instruments of Ismenias' policy were merely venal, there is nothing to surprise us in this ; Greek history, unhappily, is only too rich in analogies. The account of the Boeotian invasion of the Phocian temtory, which is full of detail, is hardly likely to be incorrect. It seems difficult to » Thucyd. III. 101. « Thucyd. V. 32. ' Diod. XII. 80. 4. * Herod. IX. 17 and 31. ^ Thucyd. II. 9 ; III. 95 ; IV. 76. 130 THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE v accept the detail here and to reject it for the preliminary intrigues. On the whole then I am disposed to accept the version in P. as substantially correct. It is a version which would, no doubt, appeal more strongly to a writer trained in the school of rhetoric than the simpler tale which we find in Xenophon. More than one story was current, that is clear. Ephorus may have preferred the more complicated tale, because it appealed to his love of the tortuous ; it does not follow that the simpler version was the true one. The naval operations, which are passed over in silence by Xenophon, occupy a large proportion of our fragment.^ The value of this portion of the narrative has been generally recognized. The touches in the story of the mutiny at Caunus, when taken in combination with the fullness of detail which is elsewhere apparent, renders it difficult to question Meyer's conclusion that the author's information came, at first or second hand, from an eyewitness. I do not propose to deal at any length with this part of the subject. Not that it is altogether free from difficulties; agreement has not yet been arrived at in respect of the chronology, and the list of Spartan vavapyoi presents a series of problems. Five vavapyoi in three years is not easy to understand, seeing that the vavapyia was held for a year ; and Pharax, the first on the list, presents special difficulties of his own. We meet with him in Xenophon early in 397 ; ^ at the beginning of P. his term of office is at an end — he is 6 trporepov va-Oapy^o^ \ and in 396 he appears in Diodorus at Syracuse. ^ Yet in the latter part of the ^ 200 lines, at least, when the Papyrus was intact. ^ Hellenics, III. 2. 12. « Diodorus XIV. 63. 4 ; 70. 3. ^apaKtSas is the form of the V THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE lai same year he is still, according to Diodorus, on the coast of Asia Minor, engaged in blockading Conon at Caunus.* This particular difficulty, however, is one which affects the credibility of Diodorus, rather than of P. If the problem is to be solved by the assumption of a blunder, it is Diodorus who must be in fault. But these are points which have been fully discussed already ; all that is to be said has probably been said by the Editors, by Meyer, by Judeich, and by W. A. Bauer.^ And, with one exception, they are points which do not affect the relative credibility of Xenophon and P. The questions involved are questions of interpretation, rather than of criticism. The discussion seems to bring home to us both the default of Xenophon and our debt to Dio- dorus ; it begins to be understood that the naval warfare, which in the Hellenics figures as a mere incident, was of more importance in determining the issue than the operations on land. Meyer's chapter on the * See- krieg ' is a masterpiece of historical insight. The point which affects the reputation of Xenophon is concerned with his statement that Pisander was appointed to the command of the fleet by Agesilaus before the beginning of the latter's campaign in Phrygia in the autumn of 395. There is no event which he dates more precisely than the appointment of Pisander as vavapyo^ : Ile/cr- avBpov 8k . . . vavap\ov KaTiaTTjcre . . . Kal UcLaauSpo^ fi€v dn^XOoiv ra vavTLKo. iirpamv 6 8k ^AyrjaiKao^i axriTep SpfLrjaey^ €7rt Trjp ^pvytav knop^mTo. Yet, as Meyer argues, it seems name in these two passages. The identity of Pharacidas with Pharax is generally admitted. » Diodorus XIV. 79. 5. ' Meyer, Theopomps Hellenika, pp. 65-30 ; Judeich, Rhein, Museum^ Ixvi (1911), pp. 129-39 ; Bauer, Die spartanischen Nattarchen der Jahre 397/6, Wiener Studierif xxxii (1910), pp. 296-314. I2 132 THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE v impossible to reject the statement of P. that Chiricrates succeeded Pollis in the command in the autumn of 395 (7rap€i\rj6T09 i]8rj 'KeipiKpaTovs ray pads tccs tS>v AaKeSai- fiovLcav KOL tS>v (TV/jLfjLd)(^coi/ , OS d(pLK€TO vavapyos Sid8o-)(^os TCO UoWlSl), and that he still held the command when Agesilaus went into winter quarters at Dascylium on the termination of his Phrygian campaign.^ Unless we are prepared to discard his whole list of vavapxoi, it is hard to see how we can disregard these two statements. Xenophon is wrong, and the subject of his error is, from Xenophon's own point of view, not at all un- important. The life-like touches which are apparent in the mutiny at Caunus can be detected in the episode of Demaenetus. Here too the narrative must go back ultimately to an eyewitness. The same holds good of the digression about the devastation of Attica in the Decelean War,^ though here the eyewitness was a Theban. The episode betrays the author's interest in Athens ; the digression his interest in Thebes. In his view of politics, and in his judgement of political motives, he shows less insight than Xenophon. His view of the attitude of the two parties at Athens, the yyoopL/jLOL KOL y(apUvT^s, the party of Thrasybulus and Anytus, and the Stj/jlotikol^ the following of Epicrates and Cephalus, is a just one ; but in the motives for their hostility to Sparta which he ascribes to the leading statesmen in Thebes, Corinth, and Argos, as well as at Athens, he shows little grasp of the political situation. Xenophon understands it better. It is just such a view, a view which rests upon the surface of things instead ^ Hell Oxyrlu xiv. 1 ; xvii. 4. ^ Hell, Oxyrh. xii. 4. The a.7ro twv ^Xwv koX rov K€pdfiov toO tQ)v oiKiwv dpidfiivoL is very striking. V THE CREDIBILITY OF THE NARRATIVE 133 of penetrating to their causes, as we should expect from Ephorus.^ The spirit of rhetoric has little in common with the scientific spirit. There remains for discussion the Boeotian League. This is a subject of sufficient importance to claim a 'lecture to itself. * Compare his account of the origin of the Peloponnesian War, Diod. XIL 41. 1. LECTUEE VI THE BOEOTIAN LEAGUE^ The digression on the constitution of Boeotia is, without doubt, the most valuable portion of the whole fragment. The Editors' judgement, that it is * the most valuable section of the Papyrus ', is confirmed by Meyer, who pronounces it ' das Glanzstiick des ganzen Frag- ments, und ganz unschatzbar '. It disposes of some long debated problems ; it disposes also of some misplaced scepticism. It solves the problem of the number of the Boeotarchs. It proves that Poppo was right in his contention that Thucydides ^ meant to reckon the eleven as inclusive of the Theban two, and not as exclusive of them ; that is, that he meant that their number was eleven, and not thirteen ; and it proves that Wilamowdtz^ and Cauer * w^ere wrong in their proposal to alter eleven into seven. It vindicates the insight of Kohler in con- ^ The chapter in the Papyrus on the constitution of the Boeotian League is' discussed very fully by the Editors (pp. 224-31), and by Meyer (pp. 92-102). It forms the subject of a mono- graph by Glotz ('ie Conseil Federal des Beotiens,^ Bulletin de Cor- respondance Helleniqite, 1908, pp. 271-8), and an article by Professor Goligher in the English Historical Beview (1908). Earlier theories, based on the very imperfect data which then existed, will be found in Freeman's History of Federal Government, vol. i, ch. iv, § 2, and in Gilbert's GriecJiiscJie Staatsaltertiimer, vol. ii, pp. 47- 58. Cf. also Head's Historia Numorum, pp. 291-300. There is a map of Boeotia, indicating the boundaries of the /xipr) and the position of the ttoXcls, at the end of Meyer's Theopomps HelleniJca. ' Thucyd. IV. 91. « Hermes, viii (1873), p. 440. ' Pauly-Wissowa, Beal-Encyclopddie, Bd. iii, p. 647. VI THE BOEOTIAN LEAGUE 185 necting the four fiovXai of the Boeotians {rai^ Tiorcrapai fiovXai9 rrnv BomTmv) of Thucydides ^ with the four fiovXai of the constitution c/y rhv fiiWovra xpot^oi^ of the Four Hundred ; ^ while the use of dp^cou as a synonym for Boeo- tarch disproves Freeman's contention that the dpxov of the Boeotians, who appears in inscriptions of a later date, was the most ancient official of the League. Its importance does not end here. For the first time we are in possession of tolerably full details regarding a typical oligarchy of the Great Age, an oXiyapyta Io-ovo/jlos ; and for the first time we have something more than a few scattered hints as to a Federal League of the classical period. It is to be regretted, however, that the author did not express himself with more precision and with less ambiguity. As is so often the case with our finds, both literary and epigraphic, for each old problem that is solved a new one suggests itself. Of the new problems two are historical ones ; the rest relate to the constitutional arrangements of the League. Of the historical problems, the more important of the two arises out of the statement that Thebes had, in addi- tion to the two Boeotarchs who properly were hers, two additional ones who nominally represented Plataea, Scolus, Erythrae, Scaphae, and certain other places, which had formerly formed part of the Plataean state, but were now subject to Thebes : twv irporepou p-lv eK€ivoi9 (the Plataeans) avfinoXiT^vo/jiiucov^ t6t€ Se avvTeXovvTcov eh ray (drj^a^. The question at once arises, What is meant by npoTipov % When were the two Plataean Boeotarchs transferred to Thebes ? To this question three answers are conceivable ; it may have been after the surrender of Plataea in 427, or after Coronea in 446, or after the ' Thucyd. V. 38. * Aristotle, 'A^. UoX. ch. 30. 136 THE BOEOTIAN LEAGUE vi secession of Plataea in 519. The Editors incline to the first of these dates. The strongest argument in their favour is the passage in the next chapter of the Papyrus in which it is stated that at the outbreak of the Archidamian War^ the inhabitants of Scolus, Erythrae, and Scaphae, as well as those of Aulis, Schoenus, Potniae, and some other places, migrated to Thebes for fear of Athenian attack : a-vvcoKta-drja-av els avrds. It seems reasonable to interpret wporepov in the light of this statement. The fact that the Plataean territory became definitely Theban when the town was razed to the ground a year after its surrender {rriv 8e yrjv . , , evifjLovTo SrjISaToi) might seem to point in the same direc- tion ; it was then that the TLXaTaus became, as a matter of fact, Theban. It may be added that Thebes was in a better position in 427 to make good her claim to a larger representation on the board of Boeotarchs than in 446. Herodotus' statements that Scolus was er yrj Tfj Qr]paia)i/^^ and that Erythrae was in Boeotia,^ do not present insuperable obstacles. The places in question may have been transferred from Thebes to Plataea in ^ Meyer originally proposed to connect this statement with the passage in Diodorus (XI. 81. 3) respecting the enlargement of the TrepifioXos of Thebes just before the battle of Tanagra (ot AaKcSat/xdvtot T^S fjikv Twv ®r}^aL(j)v TroXeo)? /xei'^ova tov TTipi^oXov KareaKevaa-av ', com- pare with this SiTrAao-tas liroL-qa-iv tols 0>;y8a9 in P.), and to interpret 0)5 6 7roA.€/AOS ToZs *A6rjvaiOLios actually took place in 457. 2 Herod. IX. 15. ^ Herod. IX. 19, VI THE BOEOTIAN LEAGUE 137 479, and recognized as part of the UXaTaus after Coronea. The real difficulty lies in the fact that it is implied by Thucydides ^ that Oenoe was the frontier town before the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War : rj y^p Oiv6rj ova-a kv fjieOoptoLs TTJs *Attiktjs Kal Boicor/iay €r€rc(j(i(rro, Kal avrSt ^povpia> ol 'AOrjvaToi €\pcoi/To onSre TrSXefios KaTaXdfioi. Meyer is therefore certainly right in his contention that Scolus and the rest must have been surrendered by Athens, and been recognized as Theban, after Coronea. It was then, according to his view, that Thebes received the two extra Boeotarchs. The position assigned to Plataea — 8vo Sh ifnkp nXarateo)!/ kol XkcoXov Kal 'EpvOpcov Kal %Ka(j>aiv Kal rcov dXXoov ^(opicou tcov irpoT^pov fi€u €K€lpois crvfiTToXiTevofjLevcov — militates to some extent against this view ; if Meyer is correct, the Theban claim was based on the possession of Scolus and the other towns, and it was anterior to, and independent of, the possession of Plataea. It may also be objected that this territory minus Plataea could hardly justify two additional Boeotarchs. A third view which is tenable does not appear to have found supporters. Thebes may have claimed and obtained the two Plataean Boeotarchs when Plataea seceded in 519. We are ignorant oi the constitution of the League at that date ; it must have differed in its arrangements from the scheme adopted in 440. But there was continuity of a kind ; the League as constituted in 446 must have borne sufficient resemblance to the League at the end of the sixth century to render plausible the assertion that the federal system in the latter half of the fifth century embodied ra kolvo, tS>v iravToav 'QoioiyrS>v wdTpta. There must have been Boeotarchs ; a League without ' Thucyd. II. 18. 138 THE BOEOTIAN LEAGUE vi Boeotarchs is hardly conceivable ; and the number eleven may well have been traditional. If Plataea had two representatives on the board, these places must have been declared vacant, and Thebes may easily have been in a position to secure them. Plataea by her secession had forfeited her rights ; the nXarau? had become de iure Qr]PaL9, though nearly a century was to elapse before it was de facto incorporated — elrriv HXaTauSa QrfpatSa 7roLrj(r€T€.^ irporepov would then mean ' before 519 '. If this view is correct, it follows that the moral to be drawn from the history of the League is not the moral drawn by Freeman. Starting from the assump- tion that Thebes had two Boeotarchs only throughout the history of the League, he inferred that the lesson which that history taught was the danger of the material, as opposed to the constitutional, preponderance of a single member of a Confederacy. Thebes became the mistress of the League, ' not because her formal position was at all extravagant or anomalous ', but because she stood so far above the other cities in respect of wealth and population. But if Thebes, from 519 onwards, had four Boeotarchs out of eleven, her formal position must have constituted a standing menace to the minor towns. It fully explains how she was enabled to become ' first the President, and then the Tyrant, of the League '. The minor historical problem is connected with Chaeronea. In Thucydides ^ it appears as dependent on Orchomenos at the time of the battle of Delium — Xaipcoveiau fj ey 'OpxofLevoy ^vvtcXcT: in P. it is independent of Orchomenos, and appoints a Boeotarch in rotation with Copae and Acraephnion. The Editors suggest ' Thucyd. III. 58. =^ Thucyd. IV. 76. VI THE BOEOTIAN LEAGUE 139 that the separation of Chaeronea from Orchomenos, some time or other between 424 and 305, was due to a desire on the part of Thebes to weaken her rival ; in this view Meyer concurs. I find some difl&culty in following this argument. If the loss of Chaeronea had been accompanied by a reduction of the representation allowed to Orcho- menos, all would be easy ; but that was not the case. Orchomenos still has two Boeotarchs, and it can never have had more. To allow it to retain the same number of representatives, both on the board of Boeotarchs and in the federal fiovXri, for a diminished territory seems an odd way of weakening its influence. The explanation must be sought elsewhere. The problems which are connected with the constitu- tional detail are of greater importance and of higher interest. We know much that we knew nothing of before, and some things that were doubtful are now certain. There remains much, however, that needs elucidation. What were the four povXatl Were they local, or federal, or both ? How did the system work 1 How is the relation of the one PovXrj to the other three to be conceived ? What was the census — the nXfjOo? Ti ^prj^idTOiv'i What was the relation of the TToXts to the ii^pos 1 These are the questions that call for an answer. If help is to be looked for anywhere, it is most likely to be obtained from that constitution which appears to have been modelled on the Boeotian, the TToXLTeia e/y top fieXXovra \p6vov of the Four Hundred.^ Were the four PovXai local, or federal, or did the fourfold system apply both to the federal and the local councils ? There can be no doubt as to what Thucydides meant ; rats Tecraapcri fiovXaT? rair Boia>Ta>if cannot possibly, in a writer so careful as Thucydides, be * Aristotle, *A^. UoX, ch. 30. 140 THE BOEOTIAN LEAGUE vi the equivalent of rais ria-a-apa-L povXai? rah trap €Kdv SwXoiv.^ But the case does not rest upon the Athenian parallel. That the qualification was the census of a hoplite may be inferred from what is one of the most distinctive features in the constitution. It is apparent that the organization of the League served two purposes at once, a civil and a military. The fiipos is a unit for civil purposes ; it determines the number of Boeotarchs, the number of members of the federal fiovXrj and of the federal courts of law, and the distribution of financial burdens : AxrAcoy 8e S-qXcoaaL Kara tov dpyovra kol tcou koivcov diriXavop Kal r^y d(T(j>opas kiroiovvTO kol SiKaairas) enepnov Kal fjL€T€T\ov dirdpTCov o/zo/cDy Kal root/ kuko^v Kal t(ov dyaOatv, It is also a unit for military purposes ; it serves to determine the contingents of cavalry and infantry. More than that, the Boeotarchs are at once the civil executive of the League and the commanders of the federal army. Is it likely that in Boeotia, where hoplites and cavalry are alone accounted of, there would be one qualification for military purposes and another for civil, when the unit of organization was one and the same for both purposes ? A further consideration may be urged. To Aristotle it seemed evident that ol rau oirXoav Kvpioi, Kal historical existence of the constitution of Draco ; at least of such a constitution as figures in Aristotle, 'A^. IIoA.. ch. 4. * ^17] iXarrov rj TrevruKLo-xi-XLOL^ was the provision in the constitu- tion ; the speech pro Poly sir ato, [Lysias], xx. 13, proves that this was very liberally interpreted after the fall of the Four Hundred : v^dv j/oyc^icra/xcVwv TrevraKio^tXtois TrapaSovvai Toi Trpay/iara, KaraXoyevs tiv iwaKia-xiXiov^ KarcXe^cv. 1624 K 146 THE BOEOTIAN LEAGUE vi fiivHv fj fiT} fiiveLv Kvpioi ttjv irokLTetav,^ Not many con- stitutions in Greece lasted so long as the Boeotian : after an existence of nearly sixty years it was destroyed by external force. And in Boeotia it was the hoplites who were Kvpioi tS>v ottXcou. If they were excluded from political rights, why should they have acquiesced so long in their exclusion "? In Periclean Athens it is different. There it is not the hoplites who are Kvpioi tS>v ottXodu ; it is the vavriKos 6)(Xo9 6 ttjv Svua/jLiv wepLTiOeh rfj TToXe/. For this very reason the work of the reactionaries in 411 could not have been permanent. It is true that we hear of v ottXcov, and they consequently needed no constitutional safeguards for their position of privilege. In the age of Pericles the people who counted were of another class, and not in Athens only. There remains the question. What is the relation of the fiipo9 to the irSXis % In the account of the constitu- tion, so far as it affected local interests (tcl iSia), the four PovXai are stated to have existed irap iKda-TTf t(£>v wokemv. In the account of the federal system the /le/joy takes the place of the TroAi?, though even here the ttoKi^ reappears. What are we to understand by a iroXis 'i Could there be more than one ttoXls in each fiipos ? Evidently there could be ; Lebadea, Coronea, and Haliartus are noXeis, yet they constitute only one fjiipo? between them ; and the same holds good of Chaeronea, Copae, and Acraeph- nium. But how are we to class Hysiae, Thisbe, and Eutresis ; or again, Scolus, Erythrae, and Scaphae? The latter, as being x^P^^ dTeixio-ra, can hardly have ranked people used to mean the Protestants ; now it means the Papists.' Bishop Wilberforce's Life, vol. iii, p. 286. 1 Thucyd. I. 141. VI THE BOEOTIAN LEAGUE 140 as TToXcfy ; the former must almost certainly have been TToXiis avvTcXii?, which was the status of Chaeronea in 424. It follows, therefore, that the four fiovXat existed in not more than ten cities. A provision that ten separate bodies should be individually consulted was inconvenient ; it is not inconceivable. OXFORD : HORACE HART M.A. PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY 14 DAY USE RETURN TO DESK FROM WHICH BORROWED LOAN DEPT. 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